Justia Criminal Law Opinion Summaries

Petitioner appealed the district court's dismissal of his 28 U.S.C. 2254 application as an unauthorized successive habeas petition. Under the AEDPA, a certificate of appealability (COA) was necessary to proceed with this appeal. However, the district court did not rule upon whether a COA was warranted and the "lack of a ruling on a COA in the district court cause[d] this court to be without jurisdiction to consider the appeal." Accordingly, the court remanded to the district court to consider in the first instance whether to grant or deny a COA.

This appeal arose from an earlier trial relating to the Enron scandal. The government alleged that Enron loaned out the stake in the barges that it owned off the Nigerian coast to Merill Lynch, risk-free and with a guaranteed return, but made it seem like a sale so that it could book a pretend profit. Defendant, a managing director at Merrill Lynch and the head of its Strategic Asset and Lease Finance group at the time of the transaction, challenged his convictions related to the sale on the grounds that the government violated his right to due process by withholding materially favorable evidence that it possessed pre-trial. The court affirmed and held that the district court did not clearly err in holding that the evidence at issue was not material.

Defendant was granted a certificate of appealability of her habeas petition where defendant was convicted in state court of second-degree murder of her husband and sentenced to life imprisonment. At issue was whether the State withheld Brady material concerning a promise made to a co-defendant and whether the trial court unconstitutionally denied defendant an impartial jury in light of Ross v. Oklahoma. The court held that this case raised a reasonable probability that disclosure of the agreement between the prosecution and the co-defendant would have produced a different result and the state court's determination to the contrary was an unreasonable application of clearly established federal law. Therefore, based on the court's disposition of defendant's Brady claim, the court did not need to consider the merits of defendant's claim under Ross. Accordingly, the court reversed and remanded with instruction to grant the writ under whatever conditions the district court may set.

Defendant was convicted of one count of conspiracy to possess with an intent to distribute controlled substances and conspiracy to distribute controlled substances, including cocaine base (crack cocaine), and two counts of possession with intent to distribute cocaine base. Defendant appealed the denial of his motion for modification of his life sentence pursuant to 18 U.S.C. 3582(c)(2), relying on a recent amendment to the sentencing guidelines for crimes related to the possession and distribution of crack cocaine. The court held that, because the district court that sentenced defendant found that defendant was responsible for 32.5 kilograms of crack cocaine, an amount far in excess of the quantity that triggered the highest offense level under the current sentencing guidelines, the district court's denial of defendant's motion for modification of his life sentence was affirmed.

Petitioner was convicted of two counts of aggravated sexual assault and a single count of indecency with a child for sexually molesting his daughter. The state contended that the district court erred by concluding that it was not constrained by 28 U.S.C. 2254(e)(2) and could conduct an evidentiary hearing to develop the factual basis of petitioner's claim. The state also alleged that the district court erred by relying on evidence from that hearing to conclude that petitioner's trial counsel had violated his constitutional right to effective representation of counsel. The court held that the district court erred in conducting an evidentiary hearing and by relying on evidence from that hearing in light of Cullen v. Pinholster. The court also held that the district court erred in granting the federal habeas petition where counsel adopted reasonable trial strategies and had not acted deficiently under Strickland v. Washington. Accordingly, the court reversed the district court and denied petitioner's petition.

Defendant was convicted of conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute and intent to distribute over 100 kilograms of marijuana. Defendant argued that the prosecutor improperly bolstered or vouched for the testimony of two Drug Enforcement Agency agents during the Government's direct examination of the agents and the Government's rebuttal closing argument. Defendant also argued that the district court committed plain error in allowing the examination and argument. The court held that the prosecutor's direct examination, considered in light of the context in which the examination was conducted, was not improper. The court held, however, that the prosecutor's rebuttal arguments were grossly improper and indistinguishable from similar arguments the court had found improper and the subject of repeated warnings. Therefore, the court held that the error was clear and obvious and, given the critical role of the credibility of the agents in the determination of defendant's guilt, the court found the error affected defendant's substantial rights. Accordingly, the court vacated the conviction and remanded for a new trial.

Defendant appealed his conviction of importing and possessing with intent to distribute fifty kilograms or more of marijuana. Defendant sought to assert a public authority defense at trial on the basis that he had been acting on the apparent authority of a local law enforcement officer to permit his conduct. The court held that the public authority defense required a law enforcement officer who engaged a defendant in a covert activity to possess actual, rather than only apparent authority to authorize the defendant's conduct. Therefore, because it was undisputed that the officer at issue lacked actual authority to authorize defendant's violation of the federal drug laws, the court held that the public authority defense was unavailable. Accordingly, the district court's judgment was affirmed.

Defendant was indicted for various federal crimes, including, inter alia, conspiracy to traffic in narcotics, membership in a criminal enterprise, murder, and attempted murder. At issue was whether defendant was competent to stand trial; whether defendant's Sixth Amendment right to effective representation was violated; and whether defendant was entitled to a new round of jury selection after his co-defendant pleaded guilty. The court held that the district court's competency finding was neither arbitrary or unwarranted where, although defendant had some symptoms of paranoia, he was competent because he was able to consult with his attorneys with a reasonable degree of rational understanding and was able to understand the proceeding. The court also held that defendant was not entitled to the appointment of substitute counsel where he intentionally refused to cooperate with his able and diligent court-appointed lawyers, was given ample opportunity to communicate with them, and simply refused to do so. The court further held that the district court adequately explained what the counsel liaison's role was and that the district court did not interfere with the attorney-client relationship. The court also held that when one or more joint defendants faced the death penalty at the time the jury was selected, death-qualification was constitutionally permissible and the court further held that if all of the capital defendants plead guilty following voir dire, the trial court need not allow a new jury to be selected. In this instance, the jury had already been selected at the time the co-defendant entered his guilty plea and defendant did not allege that the jury instructions were deficient or rebutted the presumption that the jury properly applied its instruction. Accordingly, the judgment of the district court was affirmed.

Plaintiff sued defendant, a county judge in Mississippi, under 42 U.S.C. 1983 for allegedly causing plaintiff to be prosecuted without probable cause. At issue was whether the district court properly denied defendant's motion, concluding that genuine issues of material fact precluded summary judgment. The court held that defendant was entitled to qualified immunity where the district court did not explain the constitutional right that he had purportedly violated and, under the circumstances of the case, plaintiff had not shown that defendant's actions tainted the deliberations of the magistrate who issued the arrest warrant or the grand jury that returned the indictment. The court also held that, because the appeal was resolved on grounds of qualified immunity, the court need not address whether defendant was entitled to judicial immunity. Accordingly, the court reversed the district court's denial of summary judgment.

The Louisiana Attorney General appealed the district court's order granting the habeas corpus petition filed by defendant where defendant's first trial ended in a declaration of mistrial. When the State sought to retry him on the murder charge, defendant moved to prevent the trial under the doctrine of Double Jeopardy and his motion was granted but then reversed on appeal. Defendant then filed for federal habeas relief and the State stayed his prosecution pending the disposition of his federal petition. The state argued that the district court erred by concluding that the state trial judge intentionally goaded the defense into requesting a mistrial. The court held, as a preliminary matter, that the district court did not err by conducting a de novo review of defendant's state court proceedings and applied the same standard when reviewing his petition under 28 U.S.C. 2241. The court held that testimony failed to show that the state trial judge intentionally acted in bad faith nor did the testimony show that he limited disclosure about the jury's vote to intentionally goad the defense into consenting to a mistrial. Accordingly, the district court's order was vacated and defendant's petition for habeas relief was denied.